Tag: christmas

At the Moment

Merry Christmas … Again?!

Karen

The world is spinning too fast, I’d like to get off, please.

I know I’m preaching to the choir here, but seriously folks – IT’S TIME FOR CHRISTMAS AGAIN?!

Are you ready? I’m not, though I do have some gift ideas. The only people I really buy gifts for anymore is my mom and our boys. Which is silly, because the boys are 32 and 29, but you know how it is when you’re a parent – your kids will always be little in your mind.

We put the Christmas tree up right around my birthday, which is early November. I know, we’re THOSE people. But I don’t care. I feel like we get the tree up, don’t get a chance to enjoy it because we’re so busy with work and other obligations, Christmas happens and it’s time to take it down. Nope. We’re putting it up early November and keeping it up until New Year’s. We get six weeks to enjoy it.

Plus, it’s a lot of work and I hate doing work with little pay out.

What is up with Christmas lights? We’ve had two strands burn out on us so far this year. Kevin just pus another strand on, the tree is decorated and it’s too much of a pain to take everything off, change out lights, then put everything back on again. So. When it’s time to dismantle the tree, we’ll be peeling off about two extra sets of dead lights.

Fun.

But I suppose that’s like everything else – nothing is made like it used to be. We used to get four, or more, years out of a strand of Christmas lights, now we’re lucky if we get four, or more, weeks out of a strand of lights.

We’re planning a few Christmas parties. We’re supposed to go to Kevin’s family’s party on the 15th, then we’re having my family’s party on the 22nd. We’re having Kevin’s party at his parents’ clubhouse. It’s the clubhouse that everyone in the neighborhood uses. It’s a really nice space that comfortably houses everyone. It comes with a kitchen, too, so it’s really handy. We’re planning on having my family’s party at our house on the 22nd. I think mom would have liked to have the party at her house but our house is bigger.

Hopefully, I have my voice back by then. These past two weeks have been ROUGH for me. I left work/home to drive up to Wal-Mart because I needed a few things and as I was walking into the store, I got THAT feeling. You know, THAT feeling when you start to feel sick? I can’t even describe THAT feeling … just an overall pressure/heaviness that weighs down your entire body. And it came on HARD. I had been feeling a little run down before that and had loaded up on Vitamin C, Zinc and Zicam but apparently it wasn’t enough to stop the freight train that slammed into my entire body. I quickly got what I needed from Wal-Mart and came back home. I felt ok-ish for the rest of the day but by Tuesday, my throat was really sore and I had a dry cough.

Swell.

Wednesday, my sinuses started to thicken up and my voice was raspy, but still, I thought I would feel better by Thanksgiving.

Nope.

I woke up Thanksgiving day and felt like a dog had dug me up and treated me like a beloved chew toy. Yum. We were supposed to have Kevin’s parents, my mom, the boys and Leroy over for Thanksgiving dinner. Kevin had cooked the turkey the day before, but he went ahead and cooked the entire meal, by himself, the day of (God bless him), and he ended up taking food to his folks and having lunch with them while the boys took my mom some food and had lunch with her. It was just me and my germs at home.

Still though, I had a dry cough, I could barely speak, but I didn’t feel that bad, overall. I wasn’t in any shape to be around people, but I wasn’t feeling that bad.

The week after Thanksgiving, my cough turned phlegmy, heavy and loud. I was glad, actually, that meant whatever crap I had caught was finally started to break up. My body had figured out the key to this sickness lock and I had turned a corner. Monday, I could talk but it sounded like I had a cold, Tuesday, it was a little weaker, but I started training the new girl that day and I talked ALL DAY so by the time Wednesday rolled around, I could barely speak above a whisper. I had to train her via text, which was fun … not. (Reminder – I work from home and my company uses Microsoft Teams to communicate with one another). I trained via text pretty much the rest of the week.

It’s a good thing I’m a fast typist. The new girl was being nice, she said she didn’t mind it because it slowed us down, and she was right about that! But still, I felt guilty. I’ve NEVER had laryngitis this bad in my entire life. I felt fine otherwise, I just couldn’t talk.

Friday, mom picked me up and we drove up to the Middle School to set up her Christmas craft booth. It was only a one-day event but we went up the night before to set it up. I was fine until about halfway through the set up and then a wave of nausea hit me so hard I had to go outside, around the corner of the building and throw up. I felt better for about 15 minutes and then, it started to hit me again. Mom said I looked pretty bad so she could tell I wasn’t feeling well, so we left. Mom has a harder time seeing at night, so I drove my dad’s truck back to my house. As soon as we got to my house, I said bye and rushed into the house, straight to our bathroom and threw up two more times.

Dude. I don’t know. Again, I’m NEVER sick so by this time, I’m getting pretty annoyed with myself. I don’t know if I ate something bad? Or if it was because I hadn’t eaten anything before going up to the school and I’ve been pretty sedentary because I’ve been sick and it was the sudden physical activity, or maybe it was because I sucked on a cough drop on an empty stomach, maybe it was a combination of all these things, but after emptying my stomach, I felt loads better and I feel good today.

I have A voice, it’s not MY voice. It still sounds like I have a stuffy nose but at least I can talk, people can understand me and my throat is no longer sore. I had heard, from other people at work, that a sickness has been going around and it was affecting people’s voice boxes … who knows. All I know is I’m glad I’m back to semi-normal and life has resumed once again.

The craft show on Saturday went well. I woke up Saturday, took a shower, got ready and started feeling nauseous again. AAARGH. I ate a piece of dried toast, took a Tylenol, laid down for about 30 minutes and felt like a new woman. Kevin dropped me off at the school shortly after the show started and I was able to sit with mom all day with no problem. Still couldn’t talk very loudly, but I could talk. There weren’t as many people there as we had hoped. It started out busy in the morning but by about 1:00 PM, traffic as practically nil. It was a beautiful day and a lot of people were out, but not a lot of people were at the school shopping for crafts. Overall, mom did well. She sold quite a few things, I sold some of my dorky diamond painting ornaments, my cute diamond paining cow picture and I ended up buying a super cute snowman from mom’s craft neighbor and friend.

I’m just glad I felt better and was able to sit with her. The show ended at 4:00 and we were packed up and driving away from the school by 4:20!! That has to be a record. Granted, I did move her truck up closer to the school about an hour before closing time and we lucked out and got a spot right outside the doors when it was time to leave but we timed it perfectly and kicked butt getting out of there.

Now, to get through the rest of the holidays.

I just wanted to post a little something-something to let ya’ll know I’m still here. I’m feeling the urge to write again but don’t worry, I’m sure it will go away like it usually does. Ha! I’m hoping to write a little more, if not consistently, in 2025, but you know me …

K – time to shift focus and get ready to clock on for work. Since I’ve been training I’ve been working 10:30 AM – 7:00 PM and I sort of hate it. Not the training part but the hours. This right-smack-dab-in-the-middle-of-the-day shift is for the birds. Not a fan. Boo!

Christmas is right around the corner … are you ready?!

Work Stuff

Christmas at Work

Karen

Happy New Year!

It’s 2019! Next year I will have been married for 30 years. WHAT?!

That in itself is mind blowing, but when I stop to think of the number of years I’ve been on this Earth, it doesn’t feel real. I’ve been alive since 1965. It’s now 2019.

THINK ABOUT THAT FOR A MINUTE!

It SOUNDS old but I honestly don’t feel that old. Well, most days. There are days my body creaks and moans a little more than others.

I honestly think it’s mostly because I work with so many young people. They keep me young. And my job (medical assistant for a neurosurgeon) requires that I’m constantly on my feet a few times a week so that helps, I suppose.

Work is going great. I love what I do (most days) and of course my team is phenomenal. I do have a weird dilemma though – the nurse I work with has discovered my blog. *waves* I freaked out at first and hid my blog for a time but now I’m back and I guess it is what it is. I never write anything that I wouldn’t tell someone to his/her face, but still, it’s weird to make myself vulnerable in that way. I don’t really talk much about myself, my life, my thoughts/feelings much at work so to have someone read these thoughts, here, where I just sort of do a brain dump, is … strange.

At any rate, here we are and hello! to anyone reading this in my real life right now.

Welcome to my internal madness.

The doctor I work for is amazing. He actually invited all of us to his house this past week for a Christmas lunch. His house is gorgeous. It’s brand new, he just had it built, and it’s full of impressive technology and gadgets. The decor is a bit on the minimalist side, which we all knew that was more his style, but personally, I would have liked to see a bit more warmth scattered throughout the house. When we saw his son’s messy bedroom and his attic (which is a space above his garage on the 2nd floor) and saw all of his boxes, cobwebs and other knick knacks, I breathed a sigh of relief; they are not robots after all.

Because let’s face it. We all like nice things and to have our things in their proper places but all people are messy on some level, it was nice to see his level of messy.

We had delicious Mexican food and ate our lunch on their gorgeous dining room table in front of a wall of windows that overlooked their front lawn. We then had dessert in their modern kitchen and breathed in crisp December air after he opened up a full wall of windows that overlooked his backyard. It’s an impressive house.

We then sat down and opened gifts. I feel like my doctor liked the gift I gave him.

It’s an eyeglass holder.

I bought it because we’ve all been talking about glasses lately at work, getting our eyes checked, where the best places to buy eyeglasses, and then showing our new eyeglasses off whenever we buy them and my PA mentioned my doctor didn’t really like his contacts and was back to wearing his glasses and I stumbled across this gem.

I think he liked it. Who knows if he’ll actually use it. But it was good for a laugh.

I bought my PA, nurse and secretary a ring light to clip on to their cell phones. In theory, it’s supposed to help make your selfies look better. My nurse took a pic with it and then without and I think the pic with it looked better.

It was super cheap and I’m going to buy one for myself, but I think they all liked them.

My PA made a longitude/latitude picture for us. They match the colors in our rooms at home. It’s the longitude/latitude of our residence. It’s super cool and Kevin is going to hang it up in the family room sometime soon.

My nurse gave us cute “party of ….” pictures. The number matches the number of people in our families.

My secretary gave me a book, (which I found on Unlimited Kindle and put on my Kindle) and some yummy chocolates.

My doctor gave me a CUTE little Bluetooth speaker to put in our “new” office at work (we actually just swapped spaces with another team but it’s new to me and my nurse) and a jug of protein, mixer cup and protein bars (which I’m keeping at work because I like to eat a protein bar on clinic days because momma ain’t got time to eat in between patients).

My doctor’s wife, who gave me a hug (*squee!*) and his adorable youngest daughter, hung out with us the whole time we were there and it was great to get to know them a bit better. Even though I’ve worked for my doctor as his MA for nearly five years, I don’t really know his family very well. I mean, WHY would I. But it was nice to see a different side to his life.

Our clinic hosted a Christmas open house for surrounding doctors and hospital VIPs. It was the brain child of our PA. She’s super talented and such a hard worker and her and my nurse did the bulk of the work. And WORK they did. We had 14 Christmas trees. In addition, my PA made wreaths to hang around the clinic and my PA’s mom made EVERYONE in the clinic their own stocking to hang up on our individual pods. Close to 800 save the dates / invitations went out and I think we ended up having nearly 300 people attend. We hired a Santa and the kids had their pictures taken with him. We had a hot chocolate station, a cookie-decorating station, a “sign a card for the troops” station as well as a refreshment / finger food station. Everyone walked around to each station. 

This picture is all of our nurses with Santa. Again, an AMAZING group of women. The picture below is one of our PA’s sitting with our Santa.

It’s safe to say that “Buddy the Elf” was a HUGE hit with the kids. We even had pom-pom snowballs that the kids had fun throwing at Buddy, who ran all over the clinic with the kids chasing him.

It was a hugely successful evening and the first of many open houses to come, I’m sure.

It took a lot to persuade the hospital to allow us to throw the open house, but in the end, I think it ended up making our neurosurgery department shine.

I know everyone had a good time planning it then working it.

Me? I was a runner. I constantly walked around to make sure everyone had what they needed at each station. I refilled the cookie tray, made hot cocoa and made sure Santa and our photographer had enough water. (I wracked up 15000 steps by the end of the night).

The last few weeks, with Christmas and New Year’s Day falling on Tuesdays, it’s been a ghost town at our clinic.

But not without some drama.

I think people are a bit bored and stir crazy. When we’re all busy, we’re really not paying attention to one another so a lot of things go unnoticed or not reported. But when we’re slow, well, some things stick out more.

Our management team is great, but they aren’t very proactive or timely with any sort of disciplinary actions. We have some people who spend the majority of their days on their phones and others that come up with every excuse in the book as to why they didn’t do something. Management is very aware of these individuals and yet … nothing happens. I realize that these things take time, that there are certain procedures and protocols, but I feel like stress levels are high right now. Who knows what sort of changes will happen in the new year.

Me? I’m perfectly happy with the team I have and I feel incredibly lucky to have them in my work life. I had enough drama with my old nurse, I’m DONE with drama and I’m minding my own business. I’m focusing on doing the best job I can do and everyone else is on their own. I have neither the time, nor the patience, to deal with sub-par associates. All I can do is report it to management, what they do with that information is up to them.

You can’t change people, all you can do is change the way you react to people. You have to think that way or you’ll drive yourself crazy. And honestly? Life is too short to be stressed out all the time. So I’m on a mission to stay chill. My blood pressure has been on the rise again and I’m working on getting it under control again. I need to start walking/exercising again as I know that is a large part of why my blood pressure is wonky again.

I’m looking forward to a new year and new adventures.

Life

Wrapping up the Holidays

Karen

I received nothing for Christmas. Not one gift.

Kevin and I haven’t exchanged Christmas gifts in quite some time.  I’m perfectly fine with this, it’s just … odd, I guess. I mean, when you have to sit and think really hard for something you want, it’s sort of a buzzkill for me. It takes the enjoyment out of it. And I would much rather give a person a gift he/she really wants than just come up with something so I have something to wrap and give him/her on Christmas day.

I realize that gift giving on Christmas changes when you get older. I used to feel so sorry for my mom growing up because though my dad gave her gifts, there weren’t very many of them and I just couldn’t understand how she could be okay with that.

But now that I’m older, I get it. Christmas is about so much more than getting gifts, it’s about giving and spending time with family.

I know that sounds so cliche, but it’s so true. I TRULY love giving gifts. I love the challenge of finding the perfect gift and knowing that what I gave them they will enjoy and appreciate.

At least that’s what I tell myself

I know this time of year is hard on our boys. We used to GO ALL OUT for Christmas. We gave them some really awesome memories. And we used to SPOIL THE CRAP OUT OF THEM. And by that, I mean, there would be twenty gifts for them to open.

Yes. We were THOSE parents. But we only did that a few years before waking up and realizing that was probably sending them the wrong message – it’s about quality, not quantity.

But because we had those awesome Christmases, they came to expect it. Blake seems mature about the holidays now, but I sense that Brandon continues to be disappointed in our gifts. For now all we buy them are things I know they won’t buy on their own – like clothes, underwear, socks, etc. And their stockings consist of health and beauty aides – shampoo, deodorant, toothbrushes, toothpaste, etc. Not exactly earth shattering and not exactly fun to open but I’m confident that when they get their loot home and have stocked shelves and realize how much money they just saved that month by NOT having to buy that stuff, I know they appreciate it.

Since the boys live on their own and make their own money, they can buy whatever they want when it comes to entertainment. Not to mention, their tastes have matured and I have no idea what their even in to nowadays so I wouldn’t have the first clue on what to buy them even if we did go down that road.

We did buy them a “fun” gift this year – a water cooler. WHOA. EARTH SHATTERING I KNOW. But we knew they missed our water cooler and it was my sneaky attempt to tempt them to drink more water. Blake went to Urgent Care this year because he was having trouble peeing. And when he peed, he couldn’t pee very much. My first thought was urinary tract infection. He doesn’t have a PCP, (in fact, none of us do and that’s on my list of things to accomplish in 2018, get a PCP), so he went to Urgent Care.

After waiting around for three hours, they scanned his bladder, empty, and took a urine sample. They sent him home and told him they would call if there was a problem and oh yeah, drink more water.

The same advice I’ve been telling him for years – stop drinking so much soda and drink more water.

They never called so we’re assuming he didn’t have a UTI and he has finally started eating better and drinking more so he hasn’t had an issue since that incident.

And even though the whole episode was worrisome and stressful for him, I’m sort of glad that it happened. Because when his final bill came back from that three hour visit to the Urgent Care where basically nothing was done for him, he realized that taking care of his body is not only important to feel good, but it’s ultimately better on his wallet, too.

His bill was a little over $1,000. Thankfully, he’s on my insurance and it only ended up costing him $84 dollars, but it was a good learning experience that 1. take care of your body so you don’t HAVE to make trips to the doctor/hospital and 2. health care is outrageously EXPENSIVE.

He will, however, need to find new insurance this year. He will turn 26 and it will be time to spread those wings and fly away. It will be interesting to see what his options are. His birthday is in November, so who knows what health insurance will look like in the fall.

Let’s hope his choices are better than OBummer care were.

But as far as gift giving between me and Kevin, it didn’t happen. We have mutually agreed no gifts. Our gift to each other was to book a cruise in April to the Southern Caribbean. I would rather spend nearly two weeks together than open a gift on Christmas day.

(This will make my tenth cruise and Kevin’s 11th cruise. Can you tell we love to cruise? Get yourself a credit card where you build frequent flyer miles to cash in for flights and it’s not nearly as expensive as you might think it is. Just pay your credit card off each month – if you carry a balance, then it’s not really a good deal, now is it).

It really bothers me whenever I see people on Facebook brag that they “got everything they asked for.” I’m sure they are grateful for everything they received but it just hits me wrong when they word it like that. I’m a big YouTuber watcher (yes, that’s a word in my dictionary) and it bothers me to watch “my Christmas haul” types of videos too, but I have to admit, it is interesting to see the types of things that people get for Christmas.

I just feel like, or I guess it validates what everyone thinks, that Christmas is all about the “stuff” and the true meaning is just buried somewhere.

We didn’t do much for New Year’s Eve, we never do, we’re rather chill people. The boys, my nephew, Roy and my parents came over. We played games, ate tacos and stuffed our faces with too much sugar and a tiny bit of alcohol. I tried Pinot Grigio for the first, and last time. It was nasty. I’m not a drinker, but it would be nice to find a wine that doesn’t make me want to throw up in my mouth, just a bit. I’m glad we just bought the small bottles and didn’t waste a ton of money on a big bottle.

I’ve made five resolutions that I’m going to work hard on trying to keep this year: 1. read more and watch less YouTube, 2. get everyone set up with PCP’s, 3. write more ( or in my case – SOMETHING), 4. spend more time with my parents and 5. take long weekends away from work. I feel like this past year has really taken a toll on my body and life is too short to allow work to kill me.

I hope you enjoyed the holidays! I know a small part of me is relieved it’s over and we can all move on to the next chapter/year of our lives.